Beacon

[denalidave]

Beacon beacon beacon!!!!!

 

BACON, BACON, BACON!!!!!!!

 

 

[ivan]

come out aroudn 4 today dave! let's do a simul solo or two?

[ivan]

7/13 - a lap on young warriors w/ geoff and a lap (sans cord) w/ geoff n' adam

 

7/15 - dod's jam w/ the phuzzy

 

7/17 - solo corner creep in the late evening before jetting off to pdx to pick up my peeps fresh off their wrong coast plane - read a few chapters and sucked down a liter of burgundy at the ledge until it was too dark to read

 

7/23 - 2 corner laps in a little more than an hour and done in time to get kids to the dentist, then a long walk by waterfalls (even introducing the bastardos to "5150" along the way, just for you, kev

 

7/26 - cruise'n to young warriors w/ nastia - bit of a scorcher after noon, specially for the devushka clad all in black - shiiiiiity roadwork delays on 14

 

7/27 - no one bit on the partner offer, so i spent a leisurely mornign w/ the little people - coffee n' bacon n' cats - went out to beacon at 3, uncertain what to do, packed for anything, and decided along the way, in honor of the olympics, to set a goal to climb as many solo laps as possible on the corner before getting back to the house for pizza n' wine w/ the wife in the evening - settled for 4 laps (bacon-flavored half dome day? BFHDD?) - could have done more i reckon, but ran into the company of Known Felons after lap 1 and that took a little bit of the wind out of my sails - did the pleasant last lap w/ denalidave, overladen w/ one beer, me ashamed to have left my gin n' juice in the rig for the celebratory drive home

 

perfect day, weather-wise, compared to yday - overcast, cool, variable winds - stoked to see a 3-some spending a night on ground zero, complete w/ double haul-bags n' ledge(s?) (didn't see room for the 3rd, what horrid price did he have to pay i wonder?) - thought to aid-solo ground zero i had, but they skunked me, and then that bastard timetravel'n'steve took my free 4 sum backup! a pox on all their houses!

 

dave's vid:

[video:youtube]

 

7/28 - warm n' sunny n' breezy - climbed w/ bob n' the phuzzy, both of whom did piss-poor jobs of Minding the Poisons - majestic snow-white n' toffee-brown owl winging about the arena of doom for a good half-hour - dod's to top-rope windsurfer - pumped stupid after that and the accumulation of yday - then free 4 all via the retard right start - snuff-porn wannabe free solo for 40 fucking feet, foot-stacking in constrictions n' lie-backing to get there, but a good gut-laugh, au-chevel style, at the pillar-top - jim showed late, grumpy to be tobacco-short as he tempts fate to quit - nose-trainers doing fine big-wall machinations, swinging from groudn-zero to flying swallow to practice their pendulums - dave n' crackman n' kyle flitting about - camas days clusterfucking the commute on back home!

 

7th day at beacon this season

7/31 - last of july - 8 days of beacon rock climbing this month

 

cruise'n'to right right gull n' then jills thrill w/ miker - bright, breezy n' cold - perfect! booty on jills - beers at the endless construction stops on the way back - how i long for a cigarette...

 

8/22 - 3 week beacon-hiatus - i'm in danger of losing my BRCA membership - been cavorting w/ the fam in colorado and at the oregon coast, coincidentally during the bitter depth of that 100+ pdx heatwave when the beach temps were damn near in the 40s each night - managed a dragontail clamber in thare too

 

the phuzzy made a public-transit trip to rendezvous w/ me in damned washoughal after a wicked reintroduction to work for me at the crack of dawn - climbed young warriors - a baker's half-dozen of wing enabled wave riding wacky-boys out beyond the island - elk herds grazing - good times! closed out the evening w/ little wing to the 1st pitch of right gull and then a sad attempt at tr'ing the off-width on wrong gull that got clubbed-on-the-head at just the right hour

 

9/5 - quick solo creep - tinywing (half little wing/half corner p1) to the corner to stoner ledge to young warriors - kenny n' ole'larry (thought he quit climbing?!) n' buddy dan at stoner ledge - 10th day at beacon this season.

 

9/6 - two solo corner laps, one w/ arndt (that is how that old boy spells his name, right?) while he was waiting for the "red ant" to arrive - horrified to find my good name impugned by certain unnamed low-lifes up on the little people ledge - seems they think i've been drinking their cached beer - despite my innocence, i nonetheless searched desperately to find said stranded beer so i could "protect" it better, but no dice

 

steve, yet again, climbing w/ random cuties, this one crushing on warriors and jills - gotta love an understanding wife!

 

9/7 - beacon hat-trick, 3 days in a row - 1 solo lap on the regular old corner, then one link-up i hadn't done before: tinywing => corner => hidden treats => corner => young-warriors => downclimb corner => uprising - 5 laps in 3 days

 

9/13 - lonely lap today, not a soul on the rock or on the trail, just a big, big wind, a shallow river, and a bone-dry bird-sanctuary across the way - thought i saw ole'boy dave's car in the lot so i packed not 1 but 2 tall-boys of pbr in the hopes of balancing out the debt, but nary a sight of him along the way - so sad, i had to swig'em both down as i was afeared to leave one on the ledge as a sign there warned of wanton russian-fuck-types showing up to swill'em away...

 

9/14 - 14th day at beacon this season - hardly a breathe of a breeze, odd after the howling gale of the day before - a peck of peregrines and a pretty phat pack of elk, dispersed upon the island and more thickly about the crick leading off towards bonneville - wheezy bugles and high-piercing shrieks - the powderhund on rehab on his mangled meniscus - cruise'n to jill's thrill - who/when the fuck cut out the sling and rings on the grassy ledges rap? beers and bullshit'n at the base - a heavy scent of fire in the air, like the memory of yosemite and sun-dappled mania - glorious sunset - the summer is banned and abased, fading fast in the fuck-fury dark of eight

 

9/16 - my first partner for sunday bailed on thursday, then my second on saturday, so, in the spirit of third-time's-the-charm, i settled for meself solo on this fine sabbath day

 

woke of 8 w/ the sun amplifying the undigested wine in my brain-box and biding me rise and begin the purification ritual - half my gear's been building up in the trunk of the red-devil, but i thought i shoudl make an occasion of it and go aid-solo something serious - big haulbag filled of all, i stumbled to the car w/ my gear and w/ the best breakfast i could lash together in my stertorous stupor - ended up being two pale ales and a mouthful of week old pad thai, backed up w/ a duo of sad camels

 

arrived in the lot to calm winds and calmer crowds - just didn't feel like strapping on the fifi, so reckoned to solo a corner lap first then get to it, but a few feet into the lap got to thinking back to july and the 4 laps in an evening i'd done on the occasion of the olympic kick-off - thought i oughta improve on that personal record and set the bar at six?

 

3 laps in the can and not a soul sighted - dripping sweat in the substantial heat, dawn just a memory by then as i'd arrived after 9 and the incipient breeze nothing more than a meteorological cock-tease - a hot glare and a heavy air

 

christians by the holy-fuck load cluster-fucking the trail - 4 full fucking tourbuses of the little fellows, bedecked w/ their goddamn savior's gibbot, which their leader hauled up in half-carries for the great glory of dog - "aren't you folks commanded to observe the sabbath and eschew heathen labor" i queried? led by laywers, his comment immediate the product of parsing his puzzling text: "today we do His work"

 

rounded the corner for lap 4 to find frazzled rick rigged up for a rope-solo and it didn't take long to reduce him to the dark side - we did a pair of simul solos, the first finding old boy w/ eyes as wide as irish butterballs passed a lovely lady w/ the slab well in hand, half-annoyed no doubt to weather our "helpful" comments - i can't complain about standing in line, mid-pitch, w/ such a luscious view...

 

rick fucked-off in the fullness of time and i had but one more to get my 6, but being done w/ it, felt a prime # more the thing - rick said he knew our old boy pink had once done 8, and my heart was half-set in the spirit of competition, but then surely the cut of my jib could never be so beguiling as our dear boy in his littlewing pic - came down for a 7th lap then and sent it soon enough, my head spinning, my mind twisting and wondering where it was exactly i was again in this ever-repeating scenario - coulda managed another 2 i reckon, there was sun enough, but i thought i'd wander on back to stoke the home-fires and finish some more of this never ending chicken-coop work the wife embarked on - a fine meal of eggs n' fresh peppers n' frank's sauce, finished off w/ a gullet-full of fine wine and a gut laugh over gross humor n' now it's time for school work and an early nap!

 

7 laps/day - here's to 9 by the end of october? managing 3 laps per 2 hours when there's no distractions to be had, so imagine i could manage the whole shit-eria in 6 hours and call the whole thing something like 4000+ feet of climbing/scrambling/moss-hiking?

 

9/18 - afterschool corner lap - hot stone even in the shade - jim n' adam on the ledge - casual conspiracy chatting - thoroughly tired of construction on 14 by now...

 

9/19 - had only an hour of time to play between the end of school and the start of back-to-school night and union rabble-rousing, but managed to storm out to beacon at warp speed and do the first lap i've ever thought to actually time - 32:10 (dog measured), parking lot to parking lot - ran into an old student on the run down - claims to work at a pizza joint these days and sure looks like it

 

9/21 - sick all day, if not as a dog, then at least as a puppy - snot n' sneezing - still, the last day of summer.... - mist-drops on the windshield after school, should i risk the drive? - a barren lot, the rock to meself - cruising to the corner - boooooooooty! 10 laps this week already, holy shit, at this rate in a year, if i could beg off rain, peregrines n' whatnot i could have 500!

 

9/25 - on the rebound after a week of hacking snotsicles out of my lungs great asgolf-balls - 2 laps up the corner - steve n' sal n' tim n' his special lady friend sharing the route - laughs n' hijinx - bellows of beasts out on the beatific isle

 

9/27 - my 20th day at beacon this season - 2 solo laps - not a soul on the southside nor more than 2 on the trail

 

best times today:

base to snag ledge: 2:00

to tree ledge: 4:40

to grassy ledges: 8:20

to uprising railing: 15:00

 

can't imagine me ever doing this better than 13:00 tops?

 

 

9/28 - 21st day at beacon since the opening - full moon and fucking mad rager up the rock in the rude-light - bob n' me had a run on jill's thrill after school, then crawled up the corner w/ the better part of a 6-pack - dusk by tree ledge - to little people by braille - high times n' hollering at the dusky moon - crazy smoke-cloud glitter off the river - clambered off sans headlamps - how much longer shall this indian summer insist?

 

9/29 - wife problems: full-moon free-solo sans-head-lamp! geoff n' arlo as helpful alarm clocks

 

10/1 - indian summer, a big old warm breeze like the Breath of Dog - 2 laps on the corner, then home in time to get the boy to kajukenbo.

 

10/3 - jesus, warm still outdoors but the Big Wind of Winter was on beacon today! roars n' lulls, catspaws and catastrophes playing out on the columbia - nary a soul to be seen, south side or north - a simple corner lap w/ cruising n' hidden treats n' the top of young warriors

10/4 - 3 of 4 october days climbing so far 25 days at beacon since the opening - possible to get 50 solo laps between july and november (31 so far by my count)? 'bone n' mike in the lot - hustled to climb cruising 'fore them to avoid treating them to snuff porn - jim n' sal in the lot on the way down, fresh from washing the way to the south-west of the evil poison oak - to wolfrock 2morrow for the weekend!

[matt_warfield]

If you ever want to get schooled on "5.7" go do Kor's Flake at Estes Park CO. Take your gonads. If you are married your may have to locate them.

Edited October 5, 2012 by matt_warfield

[denalidave]

If you ever want to get schooled on "5.7" go do Kor's Flake at Estes Park CO. Take your gonads. If you are married your may have to locate them.

No go, I'm in Texas till the 13th.

[kevbone]

Crusin (love that climb) to complete Jill's (one pitch to Yosy ledge)....then sundance (always awkward, but fun). Then unrope and solo off the complete ridge. Wow.....the weather has been so perfect for climbing. Gonna ride this wave until it ends. Going to smith for three days at the end of the month.

[ivan]

what's sundance?

[kevbone]

what's sundance?

 

From Yosemite Ledge you have three choices. On your right is the last pitch of Jill's Thrill. In the middle is Crazy Horse and on your left is Sundance. Guide book gives it 5.9.

[ivan]

never done it - dirty i imagine?

[kevbone]

Not really. It is fun but a little awkward.

[billcoe]

Jeff and I just got off the Crusin, Corner, Young Warriors link up. mmmmm good stuff. The fall nip was in the air and it was perfect in the sun. Felt like a high gravity day but still hella fun, maybe the wind gusts to 25-30 mph going sideways which made hanging onto the crux's of YW a tad difficult can be blamed this time instead the the usual: Age, sick, tired, shoulders killing me.

 

Shoulders have been iced and ibuprofened.

[astrov]

Ran a lap on SE Corner yesterday with Dennis H (thanks!) and a friend from out of town. Marveled at the white sand beaches on the island below (exposed by low H2O level), mama bear and cub on the train tracks, herd of elk in the slough, and falcon hitting pigeon right by the belay stance. No wind to speak of, glorious sun, and no BNSF trains all day. Then we met the mayor in the parking lot. Friend bought Dennis's shoes and is now asking me about books to learn about trad climbing ... hooked!

[denalidave]

Might do LOLP on Sat eve if it ain't too windy. Then I'm off to Walla Walla for who knows how long. One last hoorah, anyone?

[ivan]

i might be able to get out there dave, but might well be raining - hoping to come out at least on thursday afternoon before the fall sets in...

 

jealous astrov! haven't seen a beer out thee in a long time and never managed to catch a falcon in a strike

[astrov]

buddy's a biologist and has fantastic luck. you're probably just too focused on the rock, what all with your free soloing!

[denalidave]

buddy's a biologist and has fantastic luck. you're probably just too focused on the rock, what all with your free soloing!

Don't feed the animals (ego)...

[stevetimetravlr]

buddy's a biologist and has fantastic luck. you're probably just too focused on the rock, what all with your free soloing!

Don't feed the animals (ego)...

To true, he'll be soloing Jills next!

[kevbone]

Beacon on Thursday

[denalidave]

i might be able to get out there dave, but might well be raining - hoping to come out at least on thursday afternoon before the fall sets in...

 

jealous astrov! haven't seen a beer out thee in a long time and never managed to catch a falcon in a strike

It's been so long since that has happened I musta forgot it does rain there now and then.

[Dennis H]

Great climbing with you and your friend Astrov,nice too hear hes in to Trad.Was really cool watching the Elk,and Yoge and boo boo.

[astrov]

oh yeah he left some $ for you for the shoes!

[ivan]

7/13 - a lap on young warriors w/ geoff and a lap (sans cord) w/ geoff n' adam

 

7/15 - dod's jam w/ the phuzzy

 

7/17 - solo corner creep in the late evening before jetting off to pdx to pick up my peeps fresh off their wrong coast plane - read a few chapters and sucked down a liter of burgundy at the ledge until it was too dark to read

 

7/23 - 2 corner laps in a little more than an hour and done in time to get kids to the dentist, then a long walk by waterfalls (even introducing the bastardos to "5150" along the way, just for you, kev

 

7/26 - cruise'n to young warriors w/ nastia - bit of a scorcher after noon, specially for the devushka clad all in black - shiiiiiity roadwork delays on 14

 

7/27 - no one bit on the partner offer, so i spent a leisurely mornign w/ the little people - coffee n' bacon n' cats - went out to beacon at 3, uncertain what to do, packed for anything, and decided along the way, in honor of the olympics, to set a goal to climb as many solo laps as possible on the corner before getting back to the house for pizza n' wine w/ the wife in the evening - settled for 4 laps (bacon-flavored half dome day? BFHDD?) - could have done more i reckon, but ran into the company of Known Felons after lap 1 and that took a little bit of the wind out of my sails - did the pleasant last lap w/ denalidave, overladen w/ one beer, me ashamed to have left my gin n' juice in the rig for the celebratory drive home

 

perfect day, weather-wise, compared to yday - overcast, cool, variable winds - stoked to see a 3-some spending a night on ground zero, complete w/ double haul-bags n' ledge(s?) (didn't see room for the 3rd, what horrid price did he have to pay i wonder?) - thought to aid-solo ground zero i had, but they skunked me, and then that bastard timetravel'n'steve took my free 4 sum backup! a pox on all their houses!

 

dave's vid:

[video:youtube]

 

7/28 - warm n' sunny n' breezy - climbed w/ bob n' the phuzzy, both of whom did piss-poor jobs of Minding the Poisons - majestic snow-white n' toffee-brown owl winging about the arena of doom for a good half-hour - dod's to top-rope windsurfer - pumped stupid after that and the accumulation of yday - then free 4 all via the retard right start - snuff-porn wannabe free solo for 40 fucking feet, foot-stacking in constrictions n' lie-backing to get there, but a good gut-laugh, au-chevel style, at the pillar-top - jim showed late, grumpy to be tobacco-short as he tempts fate to quit - nose-trainers doing fine big-wall machinations, swinging from groudn-zero to flying swallow to practice their pendulums - dave n' crackman n' kyle flitting about - camas days clusterfucking the commute on back home!

 

7th day at beacon this season

7/31 - last of july - 8 days of beacon rock climbing this month

 

cruise'n'to right right gull n' then jills thrill w/ miker - bright, breezy n' cold - perfect! booty on jills - beers at the endless construction stops on the way back - how i long for a cigarette...

 

8/22 - 3 week beacon-hiatus - i'm in danger of losing my BRCA membership - been cavorting w/ the fam in colorado and at the oregon coast, coincidentally during the bitter depth of that 100+ pdx heatwave when the beach temps were damn near in the 40s each night - managed a dragontail clamber in thare too

 

the phuzzy made a public-transit trip to rendezvous w/ me in damned washoughal after a wicked reintroduction to work for me at the crack of dawn - climbed young warriors - a baker's half-dozen of wing enabled wave riding wacky-boys out beyond the island - elk herds grazing - good times! closed out the evening w/ little wing to the 1st pitch of right gull and then a sad attempt at tr'ing the off-width on wrong gull that got clubbed-on-the-head at just the right hour

 

9/5 - quick solo creep - tinywing (half little wing/half corner p1) to the corner to stoner ledge to young warriors - kenny n' ole'larry (thought he quit climbing?!) n' buddy dan at stoner ledge - 10th day at beacon this season.

 

9/6 - two solo corner laps, one w/ arndt (that is how that old boy spells his name, right?) while he was waiting for the "red ant" to arrive - horrified to find my good name impugned by certain unnamed low-lifes up on the little people ledge - seems they think i've been drinking their cached beer - despite my innocence, i nonetheless searched desperately to find said stranded beer so i could "protect" it better, but no dice

 

steve, yet again, climbing w/ random cuties, this one crushing on warriors and jills - gotta love an understanding wife!

 

9/7 - beacon hat-trick, 3 days in a row - 1 solo lap on the regular old corner, then one link-up i hadn't done before: tinywing => corner => hidden treats => corner => young-warriors => downclimb corner => uprising - 5 laps in 3 days

 

9/13 - lonely lap today, not a soul on the rock or on the trail, just a big, big wind, a shallow river, and a bone-dry bird-sanctuary across the way - thought i saw ole'boy dave's car in the lot so i packed not 1 but 2 tall-boys of pbr in the hopes of balancing out the debt, but nary a sight of him along the way - so sad, i had to swig'em both down as i was afeared to leave one on the ledge as a sign there warned of wanton russian-fuck-types showing up to swill'em away...

 

9/14 - 14th day at beacon this season - hardly a breathe of a breeze, odd after the howling gale of the day before - a peck of peregrines and a pretty phat pack of elk, dispersed upon the island and more thickly about the crick leading off towards bonneville - wheezy bugles and high-piercing shrieks - the powderhund on rehab on his mangled meniscus - cruise'n to jill's thrill - who/when the fuck cut out the sling and rings on the grassy ledges rap? beers and bullshit'n at the base - a heavy scent of fire in the air, like the memory of yosemite and sun-dappled mania - glorious sunset - the summer is banned and abased, fading fast in the fuck-fury dark of eight

 

9/16 - my first partner for sunday bailed on thursday, then my second on saturday, so, in the spirit of third-time's-the-charm, i settled for meself solo on this fine sabbath day

 

woke of 8 w/ the sun amplifying the undigested wine in my brain-box and biding me rise and begin the purification ritual - half my gear's been building up in the trunk of the red-devil, but i thought i shoudl make an occasion of it and go aid-solo something serious - big haulbag filled of all, i stumbled to the car w/ my gear and w/ the best breakfast i could lash together in my stertorous stupor - ended up being two pale ales and a mouthful of week old pad thai, backed up w/ a duo of sad camels

 

arrived in the lot to calm winds and calmer crowds - just didn't feel like strapping on the fifi, so reckoned to solo a corner lap first then get to it, but a few feet into the lap got to thinking back to july and the 4 laps in an evening i'd done on the occasion of the olympic kick-off - thought i oughta improve on that personal record and set the bar at six?

 

3 laps in the can and not a soul sighted - dripping sweat in the substantial heat, dawn just a memory by then as i'd arrived after 9 and the incipient breeze nothing more than a meteorological cock-tease - a hot glare and a heavy air

 

christians by the holy-fuck load cluster-fucking the trail - 4 full fucking tourbuses of the little fellows, bedecked w/ their goddamn savior's gibbot, which their leader hauled up in half-carries for the great glory of dog - "aren't you folks commanded to observe the sabbath and eschew heathen labor" i queried? led by laywers, his comment immediate the product of parsing his puzzling text: "today we do His work"

 

rounded the corner for lap 4 to find frazzled rick rigged up for a rope-solo and it didn't take long to reduce him to the dark side - we did a pair of simul solos, the first finding old boy w/ eyes as wide as irish butterballs passed a lovely lady w/ the slab well in hand, half-annoyed no doubt to weather our "helpful" comments - i can't complain about standing in line, mid-pitch, w/ such a luscious view...

 

rick fucked-off in the fullness of time and i had but one more to get my 6, but being done w/ it, felt a prime # more the thing - rick said he knew our old boy pink had once done 8, and my heart was half-set in the spirit of competition, but then surely the cut of my jib could never be so beguiling as our dear boy in his littlewing pic - came down for a 7th lap then and sent it soon enough, my head spinning, my mind twisting and wondering where it was exactly i was again in this ever-repeating scenario - coulda managed another 2 i reckon, there was sun enough, but i thought i'd wander on back to stoke the home-fires and finish some more of this never ending chicken-coop work the wife embarked on - a fine meal of eggs n' fresh peppers n' frank's sauce, finished off w/ a gullet-full of fine wine and a gut laugh over gross humor n' now it's time for school work and an early nap!

 

7 laps/day - here's to 9 by the end of october? managing 3 laps per 2 hours when there's no distractions to be had, so imagine i could manage the whole shit-eria in 6 hours and call the whole thing something like 4000+ feet of climbing/scrambling/moss-hiking?

 

9/18 - afterschool corner lap - hot stone even in the shade - jim n' adam on the ledge - casual conspiracy chatting - thoroughly tired of construction on 14 by now...

 

9/19 - had only an hour of time to play between the end of school and the start of back-to-school night and union rabble-rousing, but managed to storm out to beacon at warp speed and do the first lap i've ever thought to actually time - 32:10 (dog measured), parking lot to parking lot - ran into an old student on the run down - claims to work at a pizza joint these days and sure looks like it

 

9/21 - sick all day, if not as a dog, then at least as a puppy - snot n' sneezing - still, the last day of summer.... - mist-drops on the windshield after school, should i risk the drive? - a barren lot, the rock to meself - cruising to the corner - boooooooooty! 10 laps this week already, holy shit, at this rate in a year, if i could beg off rain, peregrines n' whatnot i could have 500!

 

9/25 - on the rebound after a week of hacking snotsicles out of my lungs great asgolf-balls - 2 laps up the corner - steve n' sal n' tim n' his special lady friend sharing the route - laughs n' hijinx - bellows of beasts out on the beatific isle

 

9/27 - my 20th day at beacon this season - 2 solo laps - not a soul on the southside nor more than 2 on the trail

 

best times today:

base to snag ledge: 2:00

to tree ledge: 4:40

to grassy ledges: 8:20

to uprising railing: 15:00

 

can't imagine me ever doing this better than 13:00 tops?

 

 

9/28 - 21st day at beacon since the opening - full moon and fucking mad rager up the rock in the rude-light - bob n' me had a run on jill's thrill after school, then crawled up the corner w/ the better part of a 6-pack - dusk by tree ledge - to little people by braille - high times n' hollering at the dusky moon - crazy smoke-cloud glitter off the river - clambered off sans headlamps - how much longer shall this indian summer insist?

 

9/29 - wife problems: full-moon free-solo sans-head-lamp! geoff n' arlo as helpful alarm clocks

 

10/1 - indian summer, a big old warm breeze like the Breath of Dog - 2 laps on the corner, then home in time to get the boy to kajukenbo.

 

10/3 - jesus, warm still outdoors but the Big Wind of Winter was on beacon today! roars n' lulls, catspaws and catastrophes playing out on the columbia - nary a soul to be seen, south side or north - a simple corner lap w/ cruising n' hidden treats n' the top of young warriors

 

10/4 - 3 of 4 october days climbing so far 25 days at beacon since the opening - possible to get 50 solo laps between july and november (31 so far by my count)? 'bone n' mike in the lot - hustled to climb cruising 'fore them to avoid treating them to snuff porn - jim n' sal in the lot on the way down, fresh from washing the way to the south-west of the evil poison oak - to wolfrock 2morrow for the weekend!

10/10 - 6 days since last i'd climbed at beacon, my longest dry spell in a month? barad dohl (!) and cheeky sheenanigans over the weekend, then high-tech dentistry and parent conferences keeping me away...

 

2 laps on the corner, car to car in 57 minutes - most enjoyable solo yet of cruising, all movement and no pauses, maybe 3 minutes total?

[denalidave]

7/13 - a lap on young warriors w/ geoff and a lap (sans cord) w/ geoff n' adam

 

7/15 - dod's jam w/ the phuzzy

 

7/17 - solo corner creep in the late evening before jetting off to pdx to pick up my peeps fresh off their wrong coast plane - read a few chapters and sucked down a liter of burgundy at the ledge until it was too dark to read

 

7/23 - 2 corner laps in a little more than an hour and done in time to get kids to the dentist, then a long walk by waterfalls (even introducing the bastardos to "5150" along the way, just for you, kev

 

7/26 - cruise'n to young warriors w/ nastia - bit of a scorcher after noon, specially for the devushka clad all in black - shiiiiiity roadwork delays on 14

 

7/27 - no one bit on the partner offer, so i spent a leisurely mornign w/ the little people - coffee n' bacon n' cats - went out to beacon at 3, uncertain what to do, packed for anything, and decided along the way, in honor of the olympics, to set a goal to climb as many solo laps as possible on the corner before getting back to the house for pizza n' wine w/ the wife in the evening - settled for 4 laps (bacon-flavored half dome day? BFHDD?) - could have done more i reckon, but ran into the company of Known Felons after lap 1 and that took a little bit of the wind out of my sails - did the pleasant last lap w/ denalidave, overladen w/ one beer, me ashamed to have left my gin n' juice in the rig for the celebratory drive home

 

perfect day, weather-wise, compared to yday - overcast, cool, variable winds - stoked to see a 3-some spending a night on ground zero, complete w/ double haul-bags n' ledge(s?) (didn't see room for the 3rd, what horrid price did he have to pay i wonder?) - thought to aid-solo ground zero i had, but they skunked me, and then that bastard timetravel'n'steve took my free 4 sum backup! a pox on all their houses!

 

dave's vid:

[video:youtube]

 

7/28 - warm n' sunny n' breezy - climbed w/ bob n' the phuzzy, both of whom did piss-poor jobs of Minding the Poisons - majestic snow-white n' toffee-brown owl winging about the arena of doom for a good half-hour - dod's to top-rope windsurfer - pumped stupid after that and the accumulation of yday - then free 4 all via the retard right start - snuff-porn wannabe free solo for 40 fucking feet, foot-stacking in constrictions n' lie-backing to get there, but a good gut-laugh, au-chevel style, at the pillar-top - jim showed late, grumpy to be tobacco-short as he tempts fate to quit - nose-trainers doing fine big-wall machinations, swinging from groudn-zero to flying swallow to practice their pendulums - dave n' crackman n' kyle flitting about - camas days clusterfucking the commute on back home!

 

7th day at beacon this season

7/31 - last of july - 8 days of beacon rock climbing this month

 

cruise'n'to right right gull n' then jills thrill w/ miker - bright, breezy n' cold - perfect! booty on jills - beers at the endless construction stops on the way back - how i long for a cigarette...

 

8/22 - 3 week beacon-hiatus - i'm in danger of losing my BRCA membership - been cavorting w/ the fam in colorado and at the oregon coast, coincidentally during the bitter depth of that 100+ pdx heatwave when the beach temps were damn near in the 40s each night - managed a dragontail clamber in thare too

 

the phuzzy made a public-transit trip to rendezvous w/ me in damned washoughal after a wicked reintroduction to work for me at the crack of dawn - climbed young warriors - a baker's half-dozen of wing enabled wave riding wacky-boys out beyond the island - elk herds grazing - good times! closed out the evening w/ little wing to the 1st pitch of right gull and then a sad attempt at tr'ing the off-width on wrong gull that got clubbed-on-the-head at just the right hour

 

9/5 - quick solo creep - tinywing (half little wing/half corner p1) to the corner to stoner ledge to young warriors - kenny n' ole'larry (thought he quit climbing?!) n' buddy dan at stoner ledge - 10th day at beacon this season.

 

9/6 - two solo corner laps, one w/ arndt (that is how that old boy spells his name, right?) while he was waiting for the "red ant" to arrive - horrified to find my good name impugned by certain unnamed low-lifes up on the little people ledge - seems they think i've been drinking their cached beer - despite my innocence, i nonetheless searched desperately to find said stranded beer so i could "protect" it better, but no dice

 

steve, yet again, climbing w/ random cuties, this one crushing on warriors and jills - gotta love an understanding wife!

 

9/7 - beacon hat-trick, 3 days in a row - 1 solo lap on the regular old corner, then one link-up i hadn't done before: tinywing => corner => hidden treats => corner => young-warriors => downclimb corner => uprising - 5 laps in 3 days

 

9/13 - lonely lap today, not a soul on the rock or on the trail, just a big, big wind, a shallow river, and a bone-dry bird-sanctuary across the way - thought i saw ole'boy dave's car in the lot so i packed not 1 but 2 tall-boys of pbr in the hopes of balancing out the debt, but nary a sight of him along the way - so sad, i had to swig'em both down as i was afeared to leave one on the ledge as a sign there warned of wanton russian-fuck-types showing up to swill'em away...

 

9/14 - 14th day at beacon this season - hardly a breathe of a breeze, odd after the howling gale of the day before - a peck of peregrines and a pretty phat pack of elk, dispersed upon the island and more thickly about the crick leading off towards bonneville - wheezy bugles and high-piercing shrieks - the powderhund on rehab on his mangled meniscus - cruise'n to jill's thrill - who/when the fuck cut out the sling and rings on the grassy ledges rap? beers and bullshit'n at the base - a heavy scent of fire in the air, like the memory of yosemite and sun-dappled mania - glorious sunset - the summer is banned and abased, fading fast in the fuck-fury dark of eight

 

9/16 - my first partner for sunday bailed on thursday, then my second on saturday, so, in the spirit of third-time's-the-charm, i settled for meself solo on this fine sabbath day

 

woke of 8 w/ the sun amplifying the undigested wine in my brain-box and biding me rise and begin the purification ritual - half my gear's been building up in the trunk of the red-devil, but i thought i shoudl make an occasion of it and go aid-solo something serious - big haulbag filled of all, i stumbled to the car w/ my gear and w/ the best breakfast i could lash together in my stertorous stupor - ended up being two pale ales and a mouthful of week old pad thai, backed up w/ a duo of sad camels

 

arrived in the lot to calm winds and calmer crowds - just didn't feel like strapping on the fifi, so reckoned to solo a corner lap first then get to it, but a few feet into the lap got to thinking back to july and the 4 laps in an evening i'd done on the occasion of the olympic kick-off - thought i oughta improve on that personal record and set the bar at six?

 

3 laps in the can and not a soul sighted - dripping sweat in the substantial heat, dawn just a memory by then as i'd arrived after 9 and the incipient breeze nothing more than a meteorological cock-tease - a hot glare and a heavy air

 

christians by the holy-fuck load cluster-fucking the trail - 4 full fucking tourbuses of the little fellows, bedecked w/ their goddamn savior's gibbot, which their leader hauled up in half-carries for the great glory of dog - "aren't you folks commanded to observe the sabbath and eschew heathen labor" i queried? led by laywers, his comment immediate the product of parsing his puzzling text: "today we do His work"

 

rounded the corner for lap 4 to find frazzled rick rigged up for a rope-solo and it didn't take long to reduce him to the dark side - we did a pair of simul solos, the first finding old boy w/ eyes as wide as irish butterballs passed a lovely lady w/ the slab well in hand, half-annoyed no doubt to weather our "helpful" comments - i can't complain about standing in line, mid-pitch, w/ such a luscious view...

 

rick fucked-off in the fullness of time and i had but one more to get my 6, but being done w/ it, felt a prime # more the thing - rick said he knew our old boy pink had once done 8, and my heart was half-set in the spirit of competition, but then surely the cut of my jib could never be so beguiling as our dear boy in his littlewing pic - came down for a 7th lap then and sent it soon enough, my head spinning, my mind twisting and wondering where it was exactly i was again in this ever-repeating scenario - coulda managed another 2 i reckon, there was sun enough, but i thought i'd wander on back to stoke the home-fires and finish some more of this never ending chicken-coop work the wife embarked on - a fine meal of eggs n' fresh peppers n' frank's sauce, finished off w/ a gullet-full of fine wine and a gut laugh over gross humor n' now it's time for school work and an early nap!

 

7 laps/day - here's to 9 by the end of october? managing 3 laps per 2 hours when there's no distractions to be had, so imagine i could manage the whole shit-eria in 6 hours and call the whole thing something like 4000+ feet of climbing/scrambling/moss-hiking?

 

9/18 - afterschool corner lap - hot stone even in the shade - jim n' adam on the ledge - casual conspiracy chatting - thoroughly tired of construction on 14 by now...

 

9/19 - had only an hour of time to play between the end of school and the start of back-to-school night and union rabble-rousing, but managed to storm out to beacon at warp speed and do the first lap i've ever thought to actually time - 32:10 (dog measured), parking lot to parking lot - ran into an old student on the run down - claims to work at a pizza joint these days and sure looks like it

 

9/21 - sick all day, if not as a dog, then at least as a puppy - snot n' sneezing - still, the last day of summer.... - mist-drops on the windshield after school, should i risk the drive? - a barren lot, the rock to meself - cruising to the corner - boooooooooty! 10 laps this week already, holy shit, at this rate in a year, if i could beg off rain, peregrines n' whatnot i could have 500!

 

9/25 - on the rebound after a week of hacking snotsicles out of my lungs great asgolf-balls - 2 laps up the corner - steve n' sal n' tim n' his special lady friend sharing the route - laughs n' hijinx - bellows of beasts out on the beatific isle

 

9/27 - my 20th day at beacon this season - 2 solo laps - not a soul on the southside nor more than 2 on the trail

 

best times today:

base to snag ledge: 2:00

to tree ledge: 4:40

to grassy ledges: 8:20

to uprising railing: 15:00

 

can't imagine me ever doing this better than 13:00 tops?

 

 

9/28 - 21st day at beacon since the opening - full moon and fucking mad rager up the rock in the rude-light - bob n' me had a run on jill's thrill after school, then crawled up the corner w/ the better part of a 6-pack - dusk by tree ledge - to little people by braille - high times n' hollering at the dusky moon - crazy smoke-cloud glitter off the river - clambered off sans headlamps - how much longer shall this indian summer insist?

 

9/29 - wife problems: full-moon free-solo sans-head-lamp! geoff n' arlo as helpful alarm clocks

 

10/1 - indian summer, a big old warm breeze like the Breath of Dog - 2 laps on the corner, then home in time to get the boy to kajukenbo.

 

10/3 - jesus, warm still outdoors but the Big Wind of Winter was on beacon today! roars n' lulls, catspaws and catastrophes playing out on the columbia - nary a soul to be seen, south side or north - a simple corner lap w/ cruising n' hidden treats n' the top of young warriors

 

10/4 - 3 of 4 october days climbing so far 25 days at beacon since the opening - possible to get 50 solo laps between july and november (31 so far by my count)? 'bone n' mike in the lot - hustled to climb cruising 'fore them to avoid treating them to snuff porn - jim n' sal in the lot on the way down, fresh from washing the way to the south-west of the evil poison oak - to wolfrock 2morrow for the weekend!

 

2 laps on the corner, car to car in 57 minutes - most enjoyable solo yet of cruising, all movement and no pauses, maybe 3 minutes total?

How about house to house in under 55 minutes? Just sayin. Come on over Sat night and see if we can match it. However, Le Casa de Goldring is occupied by a bunch of contractors for a month or six so housing is limited. You gotta come check out "The Bridge". My secret spot in between Baconville and Le Casa de Goldring.

[kevbone]

Last day for Beacon before the rain....see you after 4.....

 

Dod's link up maybe.

[ivan]

think i'm gonna check out the lacamas boulders that old boy olson put in his new guide today - anyone been there yet? seems odd i've been just a few minutes away from that joint for years and never even heard of it...